Page 17

Bright light bothers him. Kara keeps the bedroom windows covered except for a small gap in the curtains, but the rest of the house is brighter.

Light streams in from the top of the front door and over the half curtains above the kitchen sink. In the middle of the day, it’s as if there’s no cover at all. She suspects prying eyes from unexpected visitors aren’t the only thing keeping him in the bedroom. It’s the light.

She doesn’t know the details of where Wade was held captive. Small, dark places seem the obvious answer. How he shoved himself between the bed and table when he felt afraid tells her all she needs to know about what he’s grown used to.

This realization is welcome because it’s something she can fix. Kara grabs a few throw blankets, doubling up the thin curtains and covering blank spots above them. If he needs it dark, that’s fine by her.

The bedroom door is open, and she hopes he’ll have noticed the dimming of light streaming in from the hall while she busies herself making food.

That’s become a nervous habit. All she wants is to feed him.

Now that he’s finally eating, she’s overeager to shove more his way.

There’s still a gauntness to his face that reminds her that a few meals aren’t enough to reverse years of hunger.

She left him watching for the dog while she works on a late lunch, telling him to come find her in the kitchen when he’s ready. She breaks up the noodle package of ramen by smashing a cup against it and heats up water on the stove for soup.

“You don’t like the noodles long?”

Wade stands tentatively at the door, shifting his weight while she tries to filter her smile into something that won’t make him uncomfortable.

He’s made so much progress so quickly, but he wouldn’t see it that way.

Sometimes, she catches herself looking at him as if she’s trying to see the bold, energetic man she used to know, and has to force that look off her face or risk making him feel anything other than how grateful she is to have any version of him at all.

“No. I always crunch them up,” she replies while he moves further into the room.

“Need help making anything?”

She shakes her head. “Almost done. Have a seat.”

He follows her suggestion, already so tense she can feel it five feet away. The blanket of awkwardness around them has only slightly eased since his arrival.

It’s entirely possible that it’s not only Wade’s imprisonment and years of space that have them stuck in a weird phase.

Things were different between them before the world spiraled down the drain.

They often went months without speaking, separated by several states’ worth of distance after the army moved him to the next middle of nowhere.

She never intended to make it a career, but he seemed content to stay enlisted.

‘Just come with me,’ he said. ‘We can go swimming in the Ozarks on my off days.’

She rolled her eyes, her tone a mixture of teasing hope and sarcasm. ‘Play house in no name Arkansas together?’

‘Sure, why not?’

The thing about her relationship with Wade is that after all this time, they have never overtly crossed that line in the sand that could transform their friendship into something more.

They have teased the line, joked about the line, flirted with it, and made long-term life plans about growing old together.

They nearly made out while drunk more often than she can count, always stopping at the last second, but that is the extent of their progress.

It never used to bother her. At least, until those last few years, when she came to terms with her feelings for him. Then, all it did was bother her, and all she needed was to put space between them to protect her heart from the one man she could never have.

Kara has lived her life ready to run, consumed by a need to escape so she wouldn’t suffer another loss. Running from Wade came easily. Then the dead started walking the earth, and it wasn’t until she lost him for real that her purpose shifted.

Everything in her life now is separated into compartments labeled Before Wade was taken and After.

She’s tried to forget those days before all hell broke loose. Could she have saved him if she had made different choices that day? That question has weighed heavily for years. Even with him back again, her guilt remains unspoken and haunting.

It would seem they still have plenty of layers between them left to un-fuck.

He leans away automatically when she moves in to fill his bowl and she ignores it, relieved when he settles again as she joins him.

“What have you been doing other than looking for me?” he asks suddenly.

She squints at the assumption that there was room for anything else. “That’s all I’ve done.”

“Why’d you go out into the woods? Coulda stayed at that community, or here, or anywhere else.”

“I already told you I wasn’t getting any peace here, not with someone knocking on my door every day, but…it’s weird. You’ll think it’s weird.”

“I won’t.”

“I felt closer to you out there. You were always so at home in the wild.” She’s purposely avoided digging too deep into the whys and hows of her time in the woods. Sounds pitiful when she speaks it aloud, and she huffs in self-deprecating amusement. “Like I said, it’s weird.”

“You hated camping. That week we spent in the Blue Ridge one summer. All you did was bitch and moan about the bugs and having to pee behind a bush.”

She smiles fondly at the mention of the one time he convinced her to spend seven days living out of a tent by the river. “I remember. I hated it, but you loved it. It’s grown on me, plus, it’s not like I couldn’t leave whenever I wanted. The bike was my escape plan.”

His eyes go wide. “You got a bike?”

She nods. “Took it from a lot uptown years ago.”

“I’d like to see it someday,” he continues softly.

“Whenever you want. It’s waiting at Paradise Falls until we go get it.”

He only nods, and the conversation lulls, prompting her to consider something she’d been pondering since last night. There’s no better time than the present to bring it up. If they can’t at least talk about these things, there’s only an uphill battle ahead.

“So, I have an idea,” she begins. “And that’s all it is, just an idea. You can say no and tell me it’s stupid.”

He raises a brow, curious.

“I think you should….I mean, I’d like you to….try to touch me.” She winces. “That sounded less strange in my head.”

His reaction is silent and stoic, neither scoffing in disbelief nor eager to try, so she keeps going. Used to be a time he would smirk and make some x-rated comment that would have her blushing. She longs for that reply that never comes.

“I read a book once about trauma because, big shock, I did and still have plenty of that. Read about desensitization and steps for overcoming fears that might have sprung up due to traumatic situations. I thought I could get rid of some of my many phobias.”

She’s drawing attention to something he wants to cover with denial and worries that she’s gone too far, but it’s too late to stop now.

“Anyway, it doesn’t have to be now, and it doesn’t have to be anything big.

You tell me what you need, what might make it easier, and I’ll do it.

We establish a baseline and just keep building on that.

Or you can tell me it’s silly and I won’t bring it up again.

That’s okay too. I have no idea what I’m doing, to be clear, so let’s not assume I have any real training in this area. ”

He doesn’t reply at first. Only glances at her in that half attempt that doesn’t require extended eye contact, and she begins to doubt everything that’s come out of her own mouth.

They’d never been very tactile before. Took a long time until hugging became normal and even then, they weren’t the type to go out of their way to make contact.

The desire to feel him has always been there, but she’d been a pro at squashing it for a myriad of reasons. Now it’s all she can think about.

His touch moving softly across her lower back when he explored her tattoo still follows the curves in a phantom pattern.

She hadn’t expected he would do that and then he did, and she could hardly breathe.

All her focus was on staying perfectly still while he mapped her out, hoping he wouldn’t stop and trying to formulate a plan to encourage the next touch.

There are no boundaries when it comes to Wade as far as she’s concerned. If he needed her naked, she’d have tossed her shirt across the room and bared herself to him for the taking.

“Why?” he says, finally.

“Because I want to hug you again and I think, hope , that you want that, too. This seems like a logical way to get there,” she replies honestly.

This may be the first time since they met that they’re talking about a problem in plain English rather than running circles around it. She only wishes it didn’t take his abduction for them to get here.

“Did you fix any phobias? Make a dent?”

“No. But that doesn’t mean it doesn’t work. It only means I didn’t keep at it. I tried, but I got overwhelmed.”

“How do we do this?”

“However you want. There are no rules. Maybe…from behind? That seemed to help last time and I know this is starting to sound like the outtakes of a bad porn, but I promise I have virtuous intentions here.”

Sometimes, calling out how ridiculous something is helps break the tension. Her attempt at humor works, prompting a small smirk and a hesitant nod of agreement.

Instantly, she’s flustered and uncertain. This was her idea, and she’s already failing at providing direction. “Okay. How do you want me?”

It’s an innocent question, but he shakes his head with something akin to fond amusement. “First, you gotta stop talking like that.”

“Right. Sorry.”

He scratches the back of his neck, considering his options before making a small request that sounds far too defeated. “You were right. It’s easier if you turn around.”

She can do that. Looking him in the eye isn’t a requirement for their end goal. She stands on what begins to feel like wobbly legs and turns her back to him. The sound of his chair scraping against the floor is obscene, and the hair on the back of her neck prickles upward with growing anticipation.

She may as well be waiting to hear the sound of his zipper and feel the force of him taking her from behind for how nervous she is. What’s happening here isn’t meant to be sexual, but she can’t help but breathe a little faster at the warmth of his body a few inches from her back.

Kara bites her lip, willing herself to stay still and be patient.

Truth be told, she hadn’t thought he would agree. Now she’s wound tight, waiting for the first brush of his fingers. Wishes she had worn a short-sleeved shirt for more exposed skin. Then, the first hint of his fingertips across the back of her hand where it hangs at her side, has her tingling.

It’s the smallest step that feels like a mile. It shouldn’t fill her with such pride for how brave he is, but it does. His palm cups her hand even while fear seeps out in every quiver.

Be still, she tells herself. Just wait. It takes everything in her not to turn and rush into his arms, but there are some things he needs to do on his own, and this is absolutely one of them.

Slowly, their fingers slot together side by side, not curling into a hold just yet, but simply weaving into place as a test of what’s possible.

Warm breath puffs on the slope between her neck and shoulder. She shuts her eyes, imagining him behind her with his nose inches from the shell of her ear. She tilts her head the barest bit, offering a safe place to press his face, reminding herself to breathe as she waits.

He never gets there. The dog barking outside startles them both. Their hands snap apart and he springs backward, knocking over a glass of water on the table by accident while a chair tumbles onto its side.

They were so painfully close that her disappointment is palpable, but she shoves it aside and scrambles to grab a towel, only to get an earful of protest.

“Stop! Don’t need help all the time. I can do it myself.

Ain’t so fucked in the head that I can’t pick up a damn chair or clean my own messes,” he yells, hands waving wildly in all directions.

“What the hell are you doing out here with me, anyway? Middle of nowhere in some broken-down house. Tending to me when you could be out there living your life. Is this what you want? To spend every day cleaning up after me? Watching me shiver in a corner? ‘Cause it won’t get better. You should go back where it’s safe. Where you got people that….”

He trails off after having gone from zero to sixty in no time flat.

She does her best not to react. If he needs to yell at her, she can take it.

His regret is visible and instant. They stand silently in the middle of a puddle while he struggles with how to take it back before giving up and bolting for the bedroom again, leaving her alone to slump against the kitchen sink and over-analyze all her wrong turns.

She’s pushing too hard. Too fast. He doesn’t need her plans or half-remembered library psychology.

Doesn’t need or want her efforts to help that only end in shunting them further back.

She won’t cry this time. Won’t fucking do it.

Can’t keep unraveling when there’s a setback because there’s going to be plenty.

That’s how things are now, and she’ll go through every one of them rather than not have him here at all.

Kara grabs a chunk of bread and forces herself out the door to feed a bossy dog. He’s already hopped the fence to wait impatiently for his meal.

“You caused some trouble today,” she says sadly, tossing him the food. “Gonna come inside this time? Wade might like to meet you.”

She steps closer, and he snatches the last hunk of loaf off the ground and runs for the fence again.

He’s the clumsiest dog she’s ever seen. Legs for days and ears that struggle to stay pointed up, flopping in different directions.

He fumbles at the fence and lands on his face when he gets to the other side, proving that while grown shepherds may be graceful, puppies are an unfortunate mess.

“Story of my life,” she sighs. “See you tomorrow.”

Wade might be watching from the window, but she doesn’t check. He needs some space without her in it, and the traps still need to be set. She still needs to gather water to wash up herself, and there’s firewood to chop.

The flower bush stares at her from across the yard, the little petals fluttering in a gentle breeze.

She plucks a fresh one today just like before and tucks it behind her ear for safekeeping while she goes about her tasks.

He’s getting a damn flower with his dinner tonight, she thinks stubbornly, and that’s all there is to it.